Tempora muntantur…

„Times are changing and we are changing with them”. Now, that we are facing difficult times, it is worth taking a look at what changes we should make in order to adapt as well as we can. Crisis, shrinking demand, huge fluctuations in exchange rates – just to mention a few of the things we need to adapt to. No matter how difficult it may be, we should stop for a minute to think about the situation we are in, our prospects and the solutions we can come up with. This is a writing by my friend, Zoltán Pintér about the approach recommended by Janelle Barlow and Claus Moller: to utilise complaints by consumers. How many times do we complain about the service we receive and how often do we feel that our complaint has made a difference? According to surveys, the answer to the first question is almost always “yes”, while the answer to the second one is usually “never”. This is quite surprising, as most companies operate a customer satisfaction system of one kind or another. Why is it that complaints by customers rarely result in change? The Grow-group has provided support for many enterprises in improving the quality of their services and experience has shown that the absence of real change is usually due to the organisational structure of these enterprises which generally prevents them from getting a realistic picture of customer satisfaction. Systems of incentives exist which directly or indirectly serve to reduce the number of complaints, like a bonus system or a fear of the boss. The objective is to prevent management from hearing complaints. This cannot reduce customer dissatisfaction. According to a survey conducted in the US, 26 out of 27 dissatisfied clients do not complain. A reduction in the number of complaints does not translate to an improvement in customer satisfaction. Negative feedback from customers can be a strategic tool for improving profitability. Proper handling of dissatisfied customers can turn into very good publicity. According to a survey by Technical Assistance Research Program, the successful remedying of a problem will be communicated to five other people by customers, while this number is only three when customers are satisfied. Complaining customers are more likely to become loyal customers. Finding out about invisible elements of customer dissatisfaction can also function as very useful market research. We often seem to forget that selling to new customers costs 3-5 times as much as selling to existing ones. In order to use customer dissatisfaction as a strategic tool, we should consider the following: Can we discover the potential in a dissatisfied customer? Is a complaint something to hide for our employees, or an opportunity? What do we do to get passive customers to talk to us? Are complaints reaching the level where they can make a difference?